Donald Trump is My President

You may not like it.  As an environmentalist, I CERTAINLY do not like it, but it is an irrefutable fact that Donald J. Trump is our duly-elected U.S. President, and attempts by some on the Left (even two years later- I’m talking to you, Michael Moore) to delegitimize this by pointing out that Trump lost the popular vote are ultimately found wanting.

The Electoral College is delineated in Article 2, Section 1 and in the 12^th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and Donald Trump, by the only legal barometer both major parties were aware of prior to Election Day, earned 304 electoral votes versus the 227 won by Democratic Party nominee Hillary Clinton to win the presidency.  There are arguments for and against the Electoral College which I do not wish to rehash here.  Instead, I’d like to stress that one cannot repudiate a victory reached under the lawful rules both sides were playing under initially by pointing out that a different result could have been achieved using a different barometer.  

To demonstrate this, a Reddit user cited (in the Reddit user’s words) “a great analogy” from Rush Limbaugh’s November 14, 2016 show (a segment I heard live, by the way) that, predictably, is simple enough for his core audience to grasp but not subtle enough to truly drive the point home.  Rush recalled the classic 1960 baseball World Series when the heavily-favored New York Yankees (Mantle, Berra, Ford, Maris, Richardson, Howard, et al) were beaten by the Pittsburgh Pirates in seven games, despite outscoring the National League representatives 55-27 in the seven games.  Rush’s simple point is to say, hey, the ground rule to determine the World Series winner is the first team to win four games in a best-of-seven series and, if we change the rule post-Series to say, na’ah, let’s declare the Bronx Bombers (Hillary) the Series winner because they scored more runs in the Series than the Pirates (Trump).  A simple analogy, yes, but not “great” because strategy (What do I need to do to get to 270 electoral votes?) is ignored.

A better, deeper (for me) analogy would be to compare the 2016 Election to one single baseball game.  Current official baseball rules dictate the winner of a game to be the team that scores the most runs.  Usually, but not always, the baseball team (or presidential candidate) who gets the most hits (votes) wins the game (the election).  However, as five U.S. Presidential elections and countless baseball games show, the candidate (team) who gets the most votes (hits) does not always win the election (game).  Just as there is strategy involved in earning the most electoral votes (what are the swing states, and which are in play for us?  How do I allocate my time and resources?  What message do I craft to appeal to those states?) beyond winning the popular vote, there’s strategy to winning a baseball game beyond getting the most hits.  In some situations, laying down a sacrifice bunt or grounding out to the right side of the infield to advance a baserunner into better scoring position makes strategic sense, although you are giving up an out (in other words, a chance to get a hit).  Trying to hit a sacrifice fly to score a baserunner from third, although again giving up an opportunity for a hit, makes strategic sense.  Ordering a stolen base attempt to move a runner into scoring position is another strategy that, depending on circumstances, might make sense even though the subsequent opening of a base may lead to an intentional walk to the next hitter, thus “taking the bat out of their hands,” or the runner may even get thrown out, which means your team has one less opportunity to get a hit.  In these examples, a team is implementing strategies (and I can think of multiple others that would also apply to this analogy) to attempt to win in ways other than focusing on getting hits alone because they realize that hits alone do not ensure victory, just like getting the most popular votes ensures nothing.  It would be absurd for a team that wins 4 runs to 3 to have the result overturned because they were outhit 8-6.

So, anti-Trumpers:  please stop alluding to the popular vote!  Antiquated or not, the Electoral College determines our U.S. President and will continue to do so in perpetuity.  So, learn the lessons of the bitter 2016 defeat (which, if my Twitter feed is any indication, pundits on the Left have not yet fully grasped), draw the necessary conclusions as to why the Rust Belt states who decided the election favored the message of a scion whose businesses filed bankruptcy on multiple occasions over the message (or lack thereof) of the more progressive party, cease with the stupid “Drumpf” stuff, and win an election.